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Jay Z played Barclays Center (night 1 pics, video & setlist)

photos by P Squared Photography

Jay Z @ Barclays Center – 1/12/14
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The show didn’t feature an innovative stage design, as on Drake’s recent tour. Neither did it include bejeweled masks, fancy dancers or a Jesus impersonator, a la Kanye West’s crazy “Yeezus” show. Nor did it boast the presence of Justin Timberlake, who acted as a slick pop foil for the rapper during their co-headlining show at Yankee Stadium last summer.

For the first New York stop on Jay’s “Magna Carter” tour, he played to his on-going strength – as a pure rapper, capable of fast-witted, and nuanced, verbal derring-do.

It wasn’t just a smart move, it was probably a necessary one. At 44, the man born Shawn Carter doesn’t have the young buck status Drake currently commands, or the cutting-edge outrage perfected by Kanye in his latest project. That leaves him to cut the precise figure he assumed at Barclays – as both an elder statesmen and a broad-minded observer of the world, refracted through the language of hip-hop. [NY Daily News]

Jay Z brought his Magna Carter World Tour to his hometown of Brooklyn for his first of two shows at Barclays Center (which he recently announced he’d be selling his stake in) last night (1/12). With roughly two decades of music including twelve studio albums and multiple collaborative recordings to pull from, Jay pretty much delivered hit after hit, with favorites like “99 Problems,” “Dirt Off Your Shoulder,” “Izzo,” “Big Pimpin’,” “Hard Knock Life,” “Niggas In Paris” and tons more. Pictures from the show are in this post.

Jay does it again at Barclays Center tonight (1/13), and his tour includes other area dates at Mohegan Sun (1/17), Nassau Coliseum (1/19), and Prudential Center (1/22).

More pictures, along with a video and the setlist from last night, below…

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Jay Z – “Somewhere In America” at Barclays Center – 1/12/14

Jay Z at Barclays Center – 1/12/14 Setlist: (via Newsday)
U Don’t Know
Crown
On to the Next One
Holy Grail
Fuckwithmeyouknowigotit
Beach Is Better
99 Problems
Picasso Baby
Can I Live
No Church in the Wild
Somewhere in America
Big Pimpin’
Where I’m From
Empire State of Mind
Timbaland interlude
Can I Get A…
Nigga What, Nigga Who
Dirt Off Your Shoulder
I Just Wanna Love U
Niggas In Paris
Tom Ford
PSA
Clique
Run This Town

Encore:
Izzo (H.O.V.A.)
Hard Knock Life
Young Forever